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EN LIBERTAD EL 31 DE OCTUBRE 2013

The Presidential Pardon does not end the Struggle for the Liberty of Indigenous Prisoners - Alberto Patishtán

Proceso, 30th
November, 2013

From the Editorial
Board

After spending thirteen
years in prison, on Saturday the Tzotzil teacher Alberto Patishtán arrived in
Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas; there he said that the fight for the freedom of the
indigenous, who are unjustly imprisoned, did not end with the presidential
pardon.

On October 31st, President
Enrique Peña Nieto confirmed his decision to pardon Patishtán Gómez and notified
his immediate release.

Patishtán had spent thirteen
years and four months in prison as part of a 60-year sentence after being
accused of involvement in the deaths of seven policemen in an ambush in the
municipality of El Bosque, Chiapas, in 2000.

He had been in Mexico City
since October 7th undergoing radiation therapy at the “Manuel Velasco Suárez”
National Institute of Neurology and Neurosurgery for treatment of the recurrence
of a brain tumour, removed in 2012.

The teacher was received on
Saturday at the Ángel Albino Corzo Airport by members of the El Bosque Movement
for the Freedom of Alberto Patishtán Gómez.

Patishtán was taken to the
Cathedral of San Cristóbal to visit the tomb of Bishop Samuel
Ruiz.

He said he felt that his
release is not a personal triumph, but results from the demand of his community
and his defenders.

“What the people need is
justice,” he declared.

According to the newspaper
La Jornada, former governor Roberto Albores Guillén [1998-2000], whose
government was responsible in 2000 for the imprisonment of the teacher,
travelled on the same flight as Patishtán to the Chiapas
capital.